Davis Polk

Intellectual Property Litigation

Davis Polk’s Intellectual Property Litigation practice is headquartered in our Northern California office. Our IP litigators are trial lawyers with extensive experience handling cases in courts and administrative tribunals throughout the United States, including patent, trademark and copyright infringement, trade secret misappropriation, and false advertising. Our clients call on us to handle their highest value and most strategically important IP matters – especially cases that are likely to reach trial – and our industry knowledge allows us to counsel clients in securing their intellectual property, implementing initiatives to avoid litigation, and litigating successfully when necessary.

Our IP litigators have handled matters across a broad spectrum of industry sectors and technologies, including telecommunications, medical devices, networking, biotechnology, media and entertainment. We represent leading technology companies on their highest value matters as well as emerging companies on IP disputes that lie at the core of their business.

Our lawyers are ranked among the top practitioners in national and local publications including, Chambers USA, Daily Journal and Super Lawyers.

Notable Matters

Comcast Corporation in patent litigations filed by Rovi Corporation (now part of TiVo) in multiple federal district courts, the International Trade Commission and the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in its efforts to secure a renewal of Comcast’s portfolio license.

Comcast Corporation in patent infringement lawsuits against Sprint Communications, encompassing over 30 patents asserted in federal courts across the country:

Obtained a jury verdict finding that Sprint infringed three Comcast patents in the District of Delaware, which the Federal Circuit affirmed.

Secured a complete victory in the District of Delaware through summary judgment as to certain Sprint patents and judgment as a matter of law as to others, which the Federal Circuit summarily affirmed.

Resolved dispute in the District of Kansas, in which Sprint sought close to $1 billion in damages.

Fortune 50 company in various private disputes and regulatory proceedings related to compulsory copyright licenses worth hundreds of millions of dollars industry wide.

Transcend Medical, Inc. in a patent case against its sole competitor in the field of Micro-Invasive Glaucoma Surgery, in which Transcend obtained summary judgment of non-infringement on all asserted claims and invalidity as to eight of the asserted claims on indefiniteness grounds.

Fortune 50 company in a patent infringement suit brought by HealthTrio, LLC. The court granted motion for judgment on the pleadings and found all 497 patent claims invalid. The Court’s order brought to an end a four-year litigation that targeted a significant portion of the company’s healthcare informatics business.

VNUS Medical Technologies in a patent case against its competitors in the field of minimally invasive surgical procedures to treat venous reflux disease in which we secured a $45 million jury verdict.

Yahoo! Inc. in a patent case concerning targeted search methodologies brought by Xerox Corp. in which we obtained a very favorable pre-trial settlement.

Playtex Products in a false advertising case against Procter & Gamble in connection with a new line of Procter & Gamble products.

United States Golf Association in connection with trademark infringement, false advertising, and unfair competition claims arising in the market for golf handicap computation services.

DHgate in connection with a copyright and trademark infringement lawsuit filed in the Northern District of California related to Internet sales.